KATU News aired the second part of its story on student, Sequoia Chavez, and her mother, Kelly Gutierrez, regarding their ongoing legal process with the Lincoln County School District. To recap, the Lincoln City School District has been ordered by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to place Sequoia at a private placement that specializes in serving students with her condition, Prader-Willi Syndrome (PWS). The District must keep Sequoia’s placement at the private program until it can provide her with a Free Appropriate Public Education (FAPE), which in Sequoia’s case, means a total-food secure environment. In this report, the District explains its proposal for a “public separate school” as their attempted solution to provide Sequoia with what she needs. The District says that other students could be placed there as well. However, the District had very little information or details to provide in the report. Wiscarson Law attorney, Taylar Lewis, speaks to the seriousness of Sequoia’s PWS and what Sequoia needs in order to access her education. Wiscarson Law and Sequoia’s mother, Kelly, are advocating for Sequoia to stay at her private placement. KATU News also shared that it has made a records request from the state to learn how much money the District is planning to put into its “public separate school” option.
To find out more, you can find the link to KATU’s report from May 19, 2022 below: